Denney Lackey, Christ's College, Christchurch, New Zealand 2013

Christ's College on a snowy day

     Word's cannot describe the fantastic experience I had on my adventure to Christchurch, New Zealand in the summer of 2013. I travelled 18 hours into the southern hemisphere with my fellow student Caleb Carpenter into the fantasy world widely known for being the location of the Lord of the Rings films. To give the reader a glimpse of the first thing I saw from the airplane window, I post the picture below:

First sight of New Zealand

     One might think that I would get used to this landscape after 5 weeks of living as a Kiwi, but the landscape changed so suddenly in places that it was impossible for me to become bored with it.

     The city of Christchurch is a fairly small city in the southern island that has been destroyed by earthquakes over the last 5 years. While the city is still under construction on every city block, the citizens of Christchurch have gone above and beyond to restore their city to its former glory. For example, there is a mall in the center of the city made entirely of shipping containers known as the Restart Mall. This is just one of the many brilliant ideas the kiwis have come up with to bring back the beauty of the city.

View of the city from a distant hillside

     School began a few days after I arrived, and I was thrown into the students daily as if I were one of them. The typical attire was either a dark gray suit with a black and white striped tie 3 days a week or a black blazer with white pinstripes, gray pants, and a black and white striped tie the other days of the week. Although I do not have a picture of myself in the uniform, my mates from the school would be happy to model the suit.

The typical garb

     I had a fantastic host family. The Mckenzies gave me a good home, loved showing me around the the southern island, and most importantly made me feel like a true member of the family. Angus (16) and Hunter (14) were like brothers to me, and by the end of the trip we were arguing just like we were family.

The Mckenzie Family

     Christ's College is an old English-style Christian school which takes its academics, religion, athletics, and behavior of its students very seriously. About half of the student body boards while the rest go home every day. I stayed with a day boy, so I was able to interact with the family and leave the school a good bit. School days started early, about 6am, and were generally the same routine, but classes were mixed around each day of the week. I shadowed Angus for all classes (Biology, Mathematics, Literature, World History) except when he took French, I took Digital Media. The teachers made sure I was engaged in class most of the time, but they did cut me a little slack since I was not going to be around for too long. The best part of the day by far was the breaks because during the breaks, I would go with Angus to our house and hang out with all of the year 11 boys. Christ's College is on a house system very similar to that of Harry Potter. The houses competed academically as well as athletically for bragging rights and pizza parties. I was a member of Julius House, and they were a crazy group of boys.

A few members of the wild Julius House

     I was able to take some time off from school to sight-see and to go jet boating and skiing. The first day trip was with Caleb and his host mother, Mrs. Roche. We drove about an hour away into the mountains to go jet boating in a fast moving mountain stream because the jet boat was invented in New Zealand. Jet boats skim across the top of the water, and do not require a propeller to move; therefore, it can move around in very shallow water and the jets are very powerful, so it cab go up quick moving streams.

My view from the front of the boat

The trip was incredible. I got to see scenery such as in the picture above while flying up and down and doing 360 spins in a stream full of rapids. It was definitely worth the numb face and hands for a few hours.

     One Sunday afternoon my host family drove me to a town an hour and a half away to see the ocean and bay of New Zealand. We stopped in the hills on the way to take pictures of the beauty of New Zealand. The main takeaway of this entire trip was the stark contrast and the sudden changes in scenery in this country. In an hour and a half I saw the flatness of the city, the hills that surround it, the mountains beyond those hills, a lake in the hills, and the ocean. That amazed me more than anything on this trip.

Pictures from my day trip

     The highlight of the trip for me was the ski trip. I had never been skiing before and had always wanted to go, and this trip gave me that opportunity. One Tuesday, Angus and I took a bus up to the local ski mountain, Mt. Hutt, and skied all day. It was easily one of the greatest and most exciting experiences of my life. Just seeing so much snow was a completely new concept to me. I cannot say that I mastered skiing, but I did learn a few New Zealand tricks that helped me fall a little less that day.

The mountain and me

     The final big experience of my trip was being able to go to one of the largest rugby matches in the world, the All Blacks (NZ national team) versus the French, a rivalry that dates back decades. As confused as I was about how rugby was played, I cheered as hard as I would for any NCAA football game. The All Blacks stomped the French (no surprise there), and I learned how to play rugby. Well sort of...

Go Blacks

     There are so many other small details I could say to continue adding to this blog of my experience in Christchurch, but I believe that the highlights of the trip have been covered, even though the trip as a whole is a highlight of my young life. I would like to sincerely thank the Warner family, Mr. Gioia, the Mckenzies, the Roches, MBA, and Christ's College for allowing me to venture to this far away land and experience the things I did. If I could leave my little 7th grade buddy with one message before I leave MBA, it would be to go on exchange. It is as simple as that.